Wednesday, March 11, 2009

(GUEST BLOG) An Inventive Way of Giving: Miles and a Video Crew

My daughter and I have teamed up to create a ingenious and creative way to help charities. Through our company, Two Parrot Productions, we donate enough miles to fly a video crew to remote third-world countries (and we are usually on that crew personally) and create a documentary film for the charity to use for fundraising and education. As a production team we have filmed on all seven continents (but not to SA or Antarctica for non-profits, yet). The final documentaries take place in Moldova, Congo, Guatemala, Burma, Cambodia, Rwanda, Jordan, Romania, Ghana, Tanzania, Indonesia and Thailand.

Some of the projects have been donated completely gratis, while more complex documentary films have required the charity to participate financially in the post production costs. According to my daughter, Jessica Kizorek, "by the end of 2010 we will have given away the equivalent of 2,000,000 miles, and will have created a dozen videos for charity. We are planning on continuing this now through the middle of 2011."

Two Parrot just came back from shoots in Tanzania and Cuba and presently is giving away 350,000 British Airway miles (and a video crew) through an on line auction at the Business Traveler Magazine's website. What is interesting about this auction is that it will automatically benefit one charity immediately (the winning bid goes directly to the charity) but it could also benefit another charity if that charity was the winning bidder (they would end up with the raw footage of their choice). Visit the Two Parrot site for samples of the kinds of documentary non-profit videos that we've created thus far.

Why are we posting this guest entry on Charity Navigator's blog? Because Charity Navigator helped match up Two Parrot with five of the charities who eventually benefited from our grants.-by Bill Kizorek, senior partner,Two Parrot Productions

Two Parrot's contribution to the documentary world is incredible. Charities are benefited with financial support, filming support, and technical expertise when dealing with their video production projects. Two Parrot is a great partner to have by your side.

Two Parrot Productions is by far the most innovative company today doing documentaries all over the world. They have come up with the most creative ways to share with all of us what it really means "to pay it forward".

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On this blog, professionals from Charity Navigator, the nation's largest independent charity evaluator and leading donor advocate, share their thoughts on emerging issues relating to the nonprofit sector and offer tips to help you make the most of your charitable endeavors.